1S4 [August, 



record its occurrence on Cannock Chase Uie previous month, on heather. It is 

 absolutely jet-black. The prevailing form of L. .suturalis on the Chase is a remark- 

 ably dark one — quite a uniform blackish-brown without darker suture. — J. R. Le B. 

 ToMLiN, Chester: June 2dtk, 1901. 



Psallus variabilis. Fall., parasitised. — Upon examining an imago of this 

 Heteroptcron, eaplured here in an apparently healthy condition yesterday, I 

 noticed a yellowish protuberance on the right side just below the base of the wings. 

 At first I thought the insect had been damaged and the epidermis fractured, but 

 closer scrutiny showed, the protuberance to be the head of a larva which occuj)ied 

 the whole interior of the abdomen. It is opaque, soft, fleshy, pale flavous, and 

 3 mm. in length. It is nearly certainly Dipterous, since the corneous cribrary 

 organs, discrete lateral lobes and distinct segmentation of Hymenopterous larvae are 

 all wanting. Moreover, I am not aware that Hymenopterous parasites have ever 

 been bred from the Seter ojiiera, though. AUotr ice and Aphldii are frequently raised 

 from Aphides, and one or two species of Chalcids prey upon Lecaiiium. I have 

 sent the parasite, in spirits, to Mr. Vei'rall, but can hope for little enlightenment 

 from so obscure an object. — Claude Morley, Ipswich : Juli/ 3rd, 1904. 



A Natural History of the British Lepidoptera: by J. W. Tutt, F.E.S. 

 Vol. IV (with Synopsis of Contents and General Index to Vols. I — IV). 8vo. 

 pp. xvii, 535. London : iSwan, Sonuenschein, and Co. 1904'. 



The fourth volume of Mr. Tutt's great work on the Lepidoptera of these 

 islands is now before us, and the exhaustive and thorough treatment of the subject, 

 so evident in its tliree predecessors, will perhaps be best shown by the fact that only 

 twelve species of " Hawk Moths" are dealt with in nearly 500 closely ])rinted pages. 

 These include the largest, and in many respects the most interesting forms of Lepi- 

 doptera occurring in our country, and of two of these at least — Manduca atropos, 

 the " Death's-Uead Moth," and Agrius conoolvull — the literature is almost over- 

 whelming in amount, and is scattered through countless publications. As in the 

 previous volumes, Mr. Tutt has collated and arranged his material in a very clear 

 and readily accessible manner; and while in some I'espects the work may be thought 

 to err a little on the side of redundancy, it will ever remain a monument of 

 patient industry and research on the part of the writer, and an inexhaustible store- 

 house of facts and suggestions for the serious student of the Order. Certaiidy we 

 are not aware of any entomological work, except perhaps Scudder's colossal book, 

 " The Butterflies of New England," that at all approaches it in fulness and 

 thoroughness of treatment. Prof. Poulton's classic paper (Trans. Ent. Soc. Lond., 

 1888, p. 515, et seq.) on the earlier stages of Agrius convolvtili, is quoted almost in 

 extenso, and the discussion of the " squeaking " of the imago of Manduca atropos 

 occupies fully nine pages. The enumeration of the occurrences of the rarer species 

 in these islands, gathered as they have been from the entomological publications of 

 many years past, must alone have involved a vast amount of patient research. 



